As he entered the first floor of Del Robyn Fenty's home, Allentown police officer Ronald Schlegel saw someone standing at the top of a staircase and heard ammunition being chambered.

The officer testified today that he took cover while calling for Fenty to come out and speak with police.

"That's when all hell broke loose," Schlegel said during Fenty's preliminary hearing today before District Judge Ronald Manescu.

Authorities say Fenty on Sept. 4 fired 24 bullets from a .223-caliber semiautomatic rifle at Schlegel and officer Robert Carbaugh, who were called to his North Third Street home following an alleged domestic disturbance.

It sounded like a "civil war cannon," Schlegel said. "The plaster was flying apart, debris was everywhere. It was kind of chaotic."

After testimony from Schlegel, Carbaugh, two other city police officers and the defendant's wife, Chvon Fenty, Manescu forwarded attempted homicide and other charges to Lehigh County Court, where Del Fenty could face trial.

Schlegel said he drew his gun when Fenty started shooting and eventually fired 11 shots in return. He and Carbaugh suffered minor injuries; both men have since returned to work.

Fenty, 41, managed to escape the house and flee to New York, where authorities arrested him without incident Sept. 7. He remains in Lehigh County Prison in lieu of $1 million bail.

Chvon Fenty testified that her husband punched her in the left cheek following a trivial argument, prompting her 911 call the day of the shootout. Manescu also forwarded to county court simple assault and other charges related to that incident.

In the weeks before the shooting, Del Fenty had begun drinking heavily after abstaining for nearly two years, she said. "He just wasn't himself for, like, two, three weeks," Chvon Fenty said. "It was a different person."

She said her husband drove her to work and struck her just as she was about to leave the vehicle. Afterward, Chvon Fenty called her mother and then police, explaining that her husband had threatened to shoot her and officers if she reported the assault, she testified.

Chvon Fenty's mother drove her home, where she saw her husband's car parked outside their home, she testified. When Schlegel and Carbaugh arrived, Chvon Fenty reiterated that Del Fenty had struck her and that she wanted him out of the house.

She opened the front door for police, keying in the code for their front door lock. Chvon Fenty said only she and her husband know the code.

Chvon Fenty said she didn't go inside the house or see her husband during the shooting. Schlegel and Carbaugh testified they saw Del Fenty's feet and legs, but not his face.

His defense attorney sought to cast doubt on whether Del Fenty was the shooter, noting that no one saw the man shooting the gun.